McLaren title hopes ended by drain cover?

If beating Renault wasn't going to be hard enough at the Chinese Grand Prix, McLaren found its assault halved when Juan Montoya was rendered hors de combat by an errant drain cover.

Running fourth behind the runaway Fernando Alonso, but closely matched with both Giancarlo Fisichella and Kimi Raikkonen, the Colombian was unsighted as he rounded turn ten and collected the cover with his right front wheel. He pitted immediately to change the tyre, but then had to return to the pits for fuel when the safety car came out, the rules preventing tyre changes from taking place at the same time as refuelling.

The safety car remained on track for 15 minutes while the offending drain was dealt with, eradicating Alonso's near 20-second lead, but Montoya followed it back into pit-lane, the suspension, radiator and floor on his McLaren too badly damaged for him to continue at racing speeds, and eventually leading to engine problems.

Raikkonen continues to run third behind the two Renaults, but McLaren's hopes of constructors' success now appear to rest on unreliability in the Enstone camp.